Muscat: With an aim to improve the fiscal performance and achieve targets outlined in Oman’s State Budget 2023, the Ministry of Finance has planned several schemes and initiatives.
The Ministry’s Guide to State’s General Budget for Fiscal Year 2023 has outlined various projects and initiatives to improve the fiscal performance.
These include among others an Integrated Gas Company, Social Protection System, Government Services Pricing, Supply Chain Financing Scheme and Public Debt Law. Other initiatives include the Revision of Financial Law and Executive Bylaws, Programme Based Budget and Tafakur Platform.
The setting up of an Integrated Gas Company (IGC) is aimed at entrusting it with the management of all allocations, assets, rights and obligations of purchasing, selling, importing and exporting, and transporting of natural gas and relevant products.
The advantages of having established the IGC, the Ministry said, was in improving the fiscal performance of Oman by removing the expenses of purchasing and transporting of gas from the State’s general budget, and transferring the net gas revenue to the treasury.
Also the IGC will aim to enhance the efficiency of the gas sector besides ensuring the adherence of producers and consumers to the contracts/agreements signed in the gas sector.
The ministry also seeks to increase economic activity and in-country value (ICV) in the gas sector and relevant activities.
Another project to improve fiscal performance is the setting up of the Social Protection System.
This covers several schemes such as social welfare schemes, retirement benefits, social security and others. Also, various pension funds will be under the umbrella of the Social Protection System, with the aim to establish an integrated and comprehensive social protection for vulnerable people and to boost investment efficiency and ensure fiscal sustainability.
Another initiative launched by the Ministry of Finance (MoF) is the introduction of Government Services Pricing with the aim to revisit government fees and set a clear methodology that strikes a balance between service fee and its cost.
Thus, the Fee Setting Policy Handbook was introduced which would help to streamline government services by reducing the procedures and addressing the duplication in fees.
The Ministry’s Supply Chain Financing (SCF) scheme is another initiative introduced with the aim to accelerate the payment of government contractors and suppliers that have payment vouchers, worth OMR100,000 and more.
The scheme also aims at ensuring supply chain sustainability and expedites the payment process.
The Public Debt Law scheme aims to manage public debt obtained by the government from banks, financial institutions or individuals to finance its public expenditures. The law will help to regulate and manage public debt operations, diversify the sources of funding, monitor the level of indebtedness and associated risks, and improve the cash flow management mechanisms.
The Ministry of Finance further said that with an aim to modernise the financial processes and systems, the Financial Law and its Executive Bylaws are under revision by MOF in order to address the recent changes and meet the current and upcoming initiative and systems.
Another initiative is the Programme Based Budget (PBB) scheme, an advanced approach of fiscal planning that identifies public spending priorities and links expenditures to objectives and activities. The PBB aimed at providing authenticated data about the government’s performance, connect financial planning with public policies, and organise government programmes and activities, and integrate the efforts to prevent duplication.
Another important scheme of the MOF is the Tafakur Platform. It is an e-platform that aims to promote community’s participation by sharing ideas, suggestions and solutions that will help improve public financial management and achieve fiscal sustainability. The platform seeks to promote participation between MOF and society by adopting new ideas and initiatives to enhance public revenue and spending efficiency.
Source: Times of Oman